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'Nun Study' moves back to Minnesota from Kentucky

(AP) - A famous study of Alzheimer's disease
involving 678 nuns has moved from the University of Kentucky to the
University of Minnesota.

The Lexington Herald-Leader reported The Nun Study recently
moved back to where it began in 1986 because of the retirement of
its originator, UK researcher David Snowdon.

The study has tested nuns repeatedly for 20 years to analyze
their mental and physical abilities.

They are then cross-referenced
with such things as education or home background and writing
samples, and that information is then correlated with evidence of
brain tissue loss when the nuns die.

Researchers said the nuns, all School Sisters of Notre Dame,
made a perfect test group because of their homogenous lifestyle.
Sixty of the original group of 678 nuns are still alive. Their ages
range between 75 and 106 years old.

Although the University of Kentucky attempted to retain the
brain and tissue banks, writings and archive records, UK vice
president for research James W. Tracy said the sisters truly
control the collection.

"The mother house of their order is in Minnesota and the work
was begun there," Tracy said. "They are closer to the collection
there."

The University of Minnesota will formally announce its
acquisition of the study in early March. Currently, the two
universities are jointly sharing credit.

With plenty more questions about Alzheimer's left to be
answered, research will continue at both institutions.

Dr. William R. Markesbery, director of both UK's Sanders-Brown
Center on Aging and the Alzheimer Disease Center, said there have
been at least two significant discoveries to come from the study.

One involves the advancement of the disease for people who
experience a stroke, the other a conclusion that low linguistic
ability early in life makes someone more susceptible to Alzheimer's
later.

But the center is doing plenty other work in the field not
getting as much attention, Markesbery said.

"For 20 years, we've been doing work that has been much more
important on the mechanisms of brain degeneration," Markesbery
said. "It just hasn't caught the eye of the public."